Chrissy Teigen: 'Eating PLACENTA prevented postpartum depression'

The 32-year-old, who gave birth for the second time to son Miles Theodore in May, told CBS that she felt much happier this time, and she puts it down to eating her own organ.

However, scientists insist there is little evidence to back the fad, though there are plenty of risks.

Last fall, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released a report that a newborn developed life-threatening blood poisoning passed on from its mother when she took bacteria-contaminated pills.

Weeks later, researchers at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, published research showing it had absolutely no impact on a mother's mental health.

The 32-year-old, who gave birth for the second time to son Miles Theodore (left) in May, told CBS that she felt much happier this time, and she puts it down to eating her own organ

Mad Men actress January Jones credits placenta pills for giving her energy after the birth of her son Xander Dane in 2011.

Alicia Silverstone, best known for her role in Clueless, took placenta capsules after having her son Bear Blue in 2011, calling them 'happy pills'.

In 2013, Playboy model and Hugh Hefner's ex-girlfriend Holly Madison wrote on her blog saying she was planning on taking placenta pills after the birth of her daughter Rainbow.

After baby number three, Kourtney Kardashian described her placenta pills as 'life changing'.

Ex-Atomic Kitten star Natasha Hamilton said taking placenta pills 'was the best money I ever spent' after having her fourth child.

Supporters of the practice often claim the organ contains valuable vitamins and hormones that could prevent postpartum depression.

Researchers from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, analyzed 12 women who took placenta capsules and 15 who had placebo pills after giving birth.

They investigated the placenta capsules' health effects, including their ability to prevent postpartum depression.

The findings were published in the journal Women and Birth.

Results reveal placenta capsules do not decrease a new mother's risk of postpartum depression.

Study author Professor Daniel Benyshek, said: 'Our results might be seen as proof that placentophagy doesn't "really work" because we did not find the type of clear, robust differences in maternal hormone levels or postpartum mood between the placenta group and placebo group that these types of studies are designed to detect.'

Yet the findings did show consuming the placenta influences women's hormones, which could potentially have some benefits.

Lead author Dr Sharon Young said: 'While the study doesn't provide firm support for or against the claims about the benefits of placentophagy, it does shed light on this much debated topic by providing the first results from a clinical trial specifically testing the impact of placenta supplements on postpartum hormones, mood, and energy.

'What we have uncovered are interesting areas for future exploration, such as small impacts on hormone levels for women taking placenta capsules, and small improvements in mood and fatigue in the placenta group.'

Chrissy and husband John Legend now have two children, Luna and Miles

Earlier in 2017, the Medical University of Vienna published research showing the placenta contains insufficient levels of nutrients, such as zinc, iron and selenium, to benefit women's health.

It may also accumulate heavy metals, which could cause seizures and life-threatening complications if ingested, according to the researchers.

'Most mammals eat the placenta after birth, but we can only guess why they do so.

'After the placenta is genetically part of the newborn, eating the placenta borders on cannibalism.'

The placenta is most commonly consumed in capsule form, but can be eaten raw, cooked, dehydrated or in smoothies.

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y pediatric center were already in critical, end-stage conditions days before they reached the ER - after the center deliberately delayed sending them for hospital treatment, a report claims.</p><p>Ten children have died and another 23 have been sickened by the adenovirus - which infects the linings of the eyes, lungs and nerves - at the Wanaque Center for Nursing and Rehab in the small town of Haskell.</p><p>Regulators revealed the center has had a history of problems with cleanliness and hand-washing - and grieving parents have since shared that they routinely reported finding their kids dirty, with feces on their legs.</p><p>But a new report by NJ.com claims the center failed on another crucial front: an ER doctor says the children appeared to have been in a fatal stage of shock for days by the time they got to a hospital.</p><p>What's more, two anonymous workers told the site their superiors delayed sending the boys to hospital 'to keep Medicaid funds flowing'.</p><p>10 kids have died and 23 have been sickened by the adenovirus - which infects the linings of the eyes, lungs and nerves - at the Wanaque Center for Nursing and Rehab in the small town of Haskell</p><p>According to Dr Frank Briglia, the pediatrician who received two of the boys at the ER, he was shocked at their state, and their medical records showed they'd been struggling for days.</p><p>'According to Wanaque's records, both had been exhibiting signs of shock days before they were sent to the ER.'</p><p>Prior to working in the ER, Dr Briglia was medical director at the embattled Wanaque rehab center, which cares for immuocompromised kids and adults. </p><p>His role there ended when he turned whistleblower, leaking information to authorities in a lawsuit that is still pending. </p><p>He is not the first to allege that the center was slow to get proper care for the children. </p><p>Regulators revealed the center has had a history of problems with cleanliness and hand-washing - and grieving parents have since shared that they routinely reported finding their kids dirty, with feces on their legs</p><p>New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy speaking about the adenovirus outbreak with New Jersey Department of Health Commissioner Dr. Shereef Elnahal in late October. The 227-bed, for-profit facility has a pediatric unit but also cares for elderly residents</p><p>'It's been known for a while that they try to keep the kids there and treat the kids there as long as possible before having to send them out to a hospital ... so they have the bed full,' one said. </p><p>'You would be surprised how slow they were to send these kids out, even after the deaths, even after the media knew. They are still delaying,' the other said.</p><p>Adenovirus is common among children, causing about 10 percent of all fevers from childhood respiratory infections in the US.</p><p>Most kids will catch an adenovirus before the age of time, but rarely is it fatal - except children whose immune systems are already weakened by other illnesses or disease.</p><p>Some estimates suggest that as many as 50 percent of people with compromised immune systems that contract adenovirus could die from it.</p><p>Adenoviruses do not commonly break out in hospitals, but when they do they can become a grave danger to patients very quickly.</p><p>Like the common cold, which is also a viral infection, adenovirus can be spread through coughing and sneezing. You can also catch it if you touch something that has the virus on it and then touch your mouth, nose, or eyes.</p><p>For this reason, covering your mouth when you cough or sneeze and thoroughly washing your hands with soap and water are the best ways to prevent the spread of adenovirus.</p><p>
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veterans suffering from flashbacks, nightmares and insomnia, research suggests.</p><p>Scientists found nearly two thirds of ex-soldiers battling PTSD saw their symptoms improve after just three months of transcendental meditation (TM). </p><p>In comparison, only two in five reported any benefit from traditional prolonged exposure (PE) therapy, which involves recalling traumatic events and confronting distressing memories.</p><p>TM on the other hand involves thinking of a mantra or sound that settles the mind, which may allow veterans to gradually release painful memories.</p><p>Meditation eases PTSD in veterans suffering from flashbacks, nightmares and insomnia (stock)</p><p>Researchers from the US Department of Veterans Affairs, Washington DC, randomly assigned 203 ex-soldiers to receive either TM, PE or PTSD health education, with the latter acting as the control group.</p><p>All of the participants underwent 12 90-minute sessions of their allocated therapy over as many weeks, as well as being told to practice every day at home.</p><p>Results showed 61 per cent of those receiving TM had at least a 10-point improvement to their PTSD severity score after three months.</p><p>This was compared to 42 per cent who underwent PE and 32 per cent who received health education.</p><p>Severity was measured according to a standard score that takes into account the degree of flashbacks, nightmares and insomnia. </p><p>The study was published in the journal Lancet Psychiatry. </p><p>PTSD is difficult to treat, and affects between 10 and 20 per cent of military veterans.</p><p>In 2013, around 400,000 ex-soldiers in the US were known to be living with PTSD, according to the Veteran Affairs health system.</p><p>PE is recommended by the Department of Veterans Affairs, however, many PTSD sufferers refuse to try it or drop out, according to lead author and Veterans Affairs psychologist Thomas Rutledge.</p><p>Transcendental meditation was developed by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi (right). He was a guru to the Beatles, and is pictured with John Lennon And George Harrison after a public lecture in 1967 in London. He went on to found a university that the study's authors were affiliated to</p><p>Mr Rutledge believes evidence of TM's effectiveness 'allows us to put more options on the table'.</p><p>He also thinks TM may be more appealing to veterans who might associate mental-health treatment with weakness.</p><p>Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is an anxiety disorder caused by very stressful, frightening or distressing events.</p><p>People with PTSD often suffer nightmares and flashbacks to the traumatic event and can experience insomnia and an inability to concentrate. </p><p>Symptoms are often severe enough to have a serious impact on the person’s day-to-day life, and can emerge straight after the traumatic event or years later. </p><p>PTSD is thought to affect about one in every three people who have a traumatic experience, and was first documented in the First World War in soldiers with shell shock.</p><p>People who are worried they have PTSD should visit their GP, who could recommend a course of psychotherapy or anti-depressants, the NHS say. </p><p>'It’s probably less threatening. It may be easier to talk to veterans about participating in something like meditation,' Mr Rutledge said.</p><p>TM was developed by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi - a guru to the Beatles in the late 1960s. Some of the study's authors were affiliated to a university in Fairfield, Iowa, which was founded by Mr Yogi. </p><p>The Department of Veterans Affairs already uses meditation and yoga to supplement traditional PE, according to Paula Schnurr, executive director of its National Center for PTSD.</p><p>Ms Schnurr argues that while the study supports TM's usefulness in treating PTSD, longer trials are required.</p><p>She also notes just one therapist led 80 per cent of the PE. This therapy's effectiveness in the study may therefore have come down to the competence of this particular specialist.</p><p>In addition, most of the study's participants were men who had suffered combat-related trauma. It is therefore unclear if women or those with other types of PTSD would benefit from TM.</p><p>Meditation is growing in popularity worldwide. A 2017 US Government survey found 14 per cent of adults had recently meditated, up from four per cent five years earlier.</p><p>But research released earlier this year suggested meditation may worsen a person's ego.</p><p>People have a higher opinion of themselves after practicing the ancient form of exercise and mindfulness, according to a study by the University of Southampton. </p><p>
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Will restricting the devices for teenagers put former adult smokers who vape at risk to start again?</p><p>Try as she might, Brittany Kligman couldn’t free herself of a pack-a-day cigarette habit, eight years in duration. And she ached to.</p><p>She was mortified the time that a taxi driver sniffed as she entered his cab and remarked, “You’re a smoker, huh?” (And she had just showered!) She was getting more sinus infections. Because her chest felt uncomfortably tight when she exercised, she stopped high intensity interval training. Then SoulCycle classes. Finally, she quit working out.</p><p>“If you’re going to sell an adult product, you have to be prepared to secure it,” she said. “But it also seems like they’re making a lot of steps and loops for people like me. They’re taking away a flavor I used for smoking cessation. ”</p><p>She not only intends to stock up on mango at her corner smoke shop, but is working up a Plan B: “I’ll switch to Juul’s tobacco flavor. I can get around this. Just like the kids will — they can always find a way.”</p><p>Nicotine, the chemical in tobacco cigarettes that creates the addictive stranglehold that is so difficult to break, is most likely a signature reason that Juul and other e-cigarettes help former smokers like Ms. Kligman quit. In making the switch, smokers can satisfy their nicotine hunger without inhaling the dozens of cancer-causing carcinogens released by a burning cigarette.</p><p>And while these products were conceived as smoking alternatives, the Food and Drug Administration has not yet formally approved them as smoking cessation aids, and research is mixed about their effectiveness.</p><p>Now regulators are struggling with how to address competing concerns — weighing the benefits of e-cigarettes for tobacco smokers against the risks for cigarette-naive adolescents, whose developing brains are especially vulnerable to nicotine. The overwhelming majority of smokers start as teenagers, but Ms. Kligman began smoking at 25, when she was a graduate student in biomedical science. Still, the moment of induction seemed purely adolescent: She and her sister wanted an escape during a soporific visit to their grandparents.</p><p>“It’s cool,” Ms. Kligman’s sister assured her. “And it’ll make you skinnier.”</p><p>After smoking one cigarette, Ms. Kligman felt sweaty and nauseous. So she tried a second.</p><p>She began smoking every chance she got. It swiftly became a soothing oral fixation. When she felt nervous at parties or bars, cigarettes gave her an excuse to step outside. Moving to New York from Atlanta, she found that the people she was befriending were smokers. Defiantly, they stood in solidarity when nonsmokers made withering remarks.</p><p>Of course she was well aware of the health risks. She’s a medical researcher. Doctors have been in her family for generations. One boyfriend announced that she couldn’t smoke around him. “It caused me stress,” Ms. Kligman recalled, “because I craved the nicotine when I was with him and I couldn’t get it. ”</p><p>But she never had a strategy — chewing straws? doing push-ups? — to substitute when the urge to smoke came on. Each time she abstained, the irritability overwhelmed her.</p><p>“When it’s bad, you’re supposed to hang in there for 20 minutes,” Ms. Kligman said. “But I’d say, ‘I’m so done with this feeling. I’ll have just one cigarette. Or two.’ ”</p><p>She told herself: “At least it’s nicotine and not heroin.”</p><p>Last January, at a dinner party, she asked a good friend to join her outside for a smoke after the meal. Four people at the table said, “We don’t smoke anymore. We Juul.”</p><p>Embarrassed that she was still smoking, she tried a hit of someone’s Juul. She was underwhelmed, but allowed that it sort of worked. The next day she bought one. She used it for four days, then put it in a drawer and went back to cigarettes.</p><p>A month later, for a weekend visit to her friend Amy’s cottage upstate, she packed the Juul. It was seriously cold outside. When she needed a cigarette break, another guest, a runner, intervened, saying, “Just Juul inside!”</p><p>She spent that weekend indoors, juuling nonstop to get a constant “nic fix.” “I began to think, ‘This is working. It’s really working!” And it was so easy. </p><p>So she continued to vape. For weeks she coughed up murk and muck that had attached to her airways. And then … it stopped.</p><p>Now her eyes are clear. Teeth gleam. Skin looks rejuvenated. And the money! The cigarette brand she smoked daily was about $17 a pack; a package of four cartridges could run about $17. Making the switch put back about $85 a week in her pocket. With the savings, she recently bought a celebratory pair of running shoes.</p><p>She now vapes about the same amount that she had smoked — a cartridge a day, roughly the nicotine equivalent to a pack. Soon she plans to try Juul’s new lower-nicotine cartridges, hoping someday to be completely weaned. The device has overtaken her life much as cigarettes had. “I’m a hard-core Juuler,” she said.</p><p>“After 18 years of smoking cigarettes,” Amy said, “I’m not exactly worried about nicotine addiction.”</p><p>Only one friend has quit vaping. He was going through three pods a day and landed in the hospital with a rapid heartbeat. Doctors said the cause was excessive nicotine.</p><p>“His husband smashed the Juul with a hammer and told him never to vape again,” Ms. Kligman said.</p>

ing devices can swiftly induce a nicotine habit in teenagers who never smoked. The tale of one teen’s struggle.</p><p>READING, Mass. — He was supposed to inhale on something that looked like a flash drive and threw off just a wisp of a cloud? What was the point?</p><p>A skeptical Matt Murphy saw his first Juul at a high school party in the summer of 2016, in a suburban basement crowded with kids shouting over hip-hop and swigging from Poland Spring water bottles filled with bottom-shelf vodka, followed by Diet Coke chasers.</p><p>Everyone knew better than to smoke cigarettes. But a few were amusing themselves by blowing voluptuous clouds with clunky vapes that had been around since middle school. This Juul looked puny in comparison. Just try it, his friend urged. It’s awesome.</p><p>Matt, 17, drew a pleasing, minty moistness into his mouth. Then he held it, kicked it to the back of his throat and let it balloon his lungs. Blinking in astonishment at the euphoric power-punch of the nicotine, he felt it — what he would later refer to as “the head rush.”</p><p>The next day, he asked to hit his friend’s Juul again. And the next and the next. He began seeking it out wherever he could, that irresistible feeling — three, sometimes four hits a day.</p><p>He would come to hate himself for being dependent on the tiny device, which he nicknamed his “11th finger.” Yet any thought of quitting made him crazy-anxious.</p><p>Experiences like Matt’s have placed Juul at the epicenter of a national debate. On one side stand longtime adult smokers who celebrate the device as the aid that finally helped them quit smoking. On the other are teenagers who have never smoked a cigarette but who have swiftly become addicted to Juul’s intense nicotine hits.</p><p>The science about long-term effects of the other chemicals and small metals in the vaporized liquids is unsettled, not only because formulations vary widely and are often undisclosed, but because e-cigarettes have not been around long enough to study thoroughly.</p><p>Perhaps what alarms public health experts most about e-cigarettes generally and Juul in particular is nicotine which, when vaporized, is absorbed by the body within seconds, much faster than when delivered by chewing gum or patches. Its potent addictive properties, doctors say, can be most pronounced in teenagers.</p><p>After a few weeks of bumming daily hits from friends (called “fiending”), Matt went on a family vacation out West. On his second day without a Juul, he found he wanted one desperately. On the third, he couldn’t take it anymore.</p><p>He searched Juul’s website to find a local store that sold it, and ordered an Uber to get there, mumbling a nonchalant excuse to relatives. Between the cost of the ride service plus the Juul “starter” kit, he spent $100 to sate his need.</p><p>Soon, he escalated to a daily pod, sometimes more. He was spending $40 a week, draining his Christmas and birthday money, and his paycheck from his part-time job at Chili’s.</p><p>Matt doesn’t come across as a cool alpha. He’s an easy, approachable kid with a certain sweetness, voted “best personality” by his high school classmates. Focused on achieving academic and financial success, he stayed away from marijuana, alcohol and cigarettes. The Juul, he thought, was a harmless way to look like an edgy risk-taker.</p><p>It became stitched into his social identity, and bound him to his buddies, who would ride around town hitting their Juuls in one friend’s 2002 Volvo. By the time he graduated from high school in 2017, four of his five closest friends were also daily Juulers.</p><p>He and other athletes noticed they would get out of breath more quickly. “We called it ‘Juul lung,’ ” Matt said. “We knew it lowered our performance but we saw that as a sacrifice we were willing to make.”</p><p>There is an art and artifice to being a teenage Juuler, Matt explained during numerous long conversations, including one over a recent lunch at a local pizza shop. You have to scope out which convenience stores will card you and which will look away, so long as you pay their inflated prices.</p><p>Near Matt’s house in Reading, a middle-class Boston suburb, there are two convenience stores on West Street. The first won’t sell you e-cigarettes unless you are 21. The second was just over the town line in neighboring Woburn, where the legal age until recently was 18. Turned away in Reading, Matt and his friends would simply saunter down the block, where they could pass scrutiny.</p><p>What he had initially derided as Juul’s pitiful wisp of nearly odor-free vapor turned out to be a great advantage. Teachers were clueless. If his parents walked into his room five seconds after he exhaled, they wouldn’t know. “The Juul was super, super sneaky and I loved it,” he said.</p><p>But by the time he got to college, he began to admit to himself he had a problem. He was majoring in biochemistry at the University of Vermont and feeling overwhelmed by the workload; the Juul was his only stress-escape. To limit his use, he kept it in his dorm room rather than carry it with him.</p><p>But soon, he realized: “All I wanted was to be in my room.”</p><p>He had 40 minutes between classes: Ten minutes, bike to the dorm. Hit Juul, 20 minutes. Ten minutes, bike to next class. Repeat.</p><p>By now his vaping was about maintenance, keeping the craving irritability at bay. He knew things had gotten just ridiculous, but there was nothing to be done about it. He even fixed a Velcro strip on the dresser next to his dorm room bed and stuck the Juul on it, so that as soon as he opened his eyes in the morning he could just reach up for a hit: first, best, only head rush of the day.</p><p>One girl on his dorm hall sold Juul pods from stock she had bought from a guy who ordered armloads on the internet. Unlike back home in high school, college students vaped in public everywhere — in lecture halls, at hockey games, in the dorm common rooms.</p><p>“Matt was open about wishing he didn’t do it,” said Tucker Houston, his freshman roommate. “It was a constant battle for him. People would tell him that they’d want to buy a Juul and he’d be like, ‘No! You don’t want to, it’s not cool, it’s not fun.’ He became known as the juuling anti-Juul advocate.”</p><p>This past summer, Matt returned home to work construction for his father, a building contractor. In the full sway of his addiction, he stuck the empty pods in his backpack so they wouldn’t be spotted in the household trash. He hid the Juul in his bedroom, doing without it on the job for up to six hours at a stretch.</p><p>“But I knew if my parents caught me, I couldn’t do it again, and that represented a future of not doing it,” Matt said. “I rationalized that it was better to do without it briefly, than forever.”</p><p>Then he found that the delayed gratification from leaving it at home was fantastic. “If you wait an hour, it feels great. But if you wait five hours, it feels unbelievable.”</p><p>At the end of the day, he would take a long, two-second draw, and keep it in his lungs, a practice called “zeroing,” because his body absorbed all the vapor, exhaling none. He’d zero it four or five times, feel dizzy, blink about 10 times, and then be fine.</p><p>One day, Matt’s mother walked into his room to collect his dirty laundry. There was his backpack, unzipped, open.</p><p>David Murphy, Matt’s father, was startled by the extent of Matt’s Juul concealment. He hadn’t suspected something was amiss. Matt’s behavior never seemed appreciably altered.</p><p>The vaping had to end, Mr. Murphy ordered. “I said, ‘Nicotine is a lifelong burden. There’s a big company with its hand in your pocket, distracting your thought process continuously. Juuling is a huge undocumented risk. Now, how do we come back together as a family and solve this problem?”</p><p>Two hours into the tearful conversation, Matt concluded: “I could not justify the addiction anymore. And I realized my parents were my allies. Because I wanted to stop and they wanted me to stop.”</p><p>Because Juul is so new, there is no consensus protocol for how teenagers should withdraw. Matt devised a weaning regimen: every two hours, five short hits. Then longer breaks, fewer hits.</p><p>One June day he was riding shotgun in the Volvo with his old friends. As he was about to take a scheduled hit, he grew despairing and exasperated. He had tried quitting before but it had never worked; would he always be chained to this gadget? Impulsively, he tried to throw the Juul out the car window, but the window stuck. So he abruptly yanked back the sunroof and heaved it to the street.</p><p>One friend, sitting in the back, cheered and pumped his fist. But another scowled — he would happily have taken Matt’s Juul.</p><p>“I felt strong for five minutes,” Matt said. “And then I felt really weak. I only realized the magnitude of my addiction when I stopped.”</p><p>Nicotine withdrawal, he said, was hell. He was overtaken with bouts of anxiety. Who was he without his 11th finger? He would get the shakes, curl up in his bed, overcome with a sense of powerlessness.</p><p>“When Matt withdrew, he’d flip out a lot, especially when other people had it around him,” said Jared Stack, a friend since elementary school. “They wouldn’t stop doing it just because he had. They didn’t care — because they were addicted too.”</p><p>It was the whirring, the purring, the sound of their Juuls firing up, that would trigger Matt. Yet avoiding his friends was inconceivable.</p><p>After three weeks, the worst of it passed. Even still, Matt can tick off to the day how long it’s been since he stopped on June 6: 163 days as of Friday.</p><p>He transferred to the University of Massachusetts in Lowell, majoring in business and living at home. Whenever he feels the Juul urge now, he tells himself, “I’d have to go through the whole horrible dark time that is being addicted and then quitting.”</p><p>His eyes brightened as he gulped the last of his pizza, long limbs splayed everywhere. Instead, he said, he tries to help friends who want to quit. “They text me all the time when they’re trying. They’ll say, ‘Did you experience this?’</p><p>“And I say, ‘Yes,’ because I want them to know I understand,” he said. “And then I tell them, ‘But it gets better.’ Because it does.”</p>

vaccinated than at this time last year, it emerged yesterday.</p><p>Figures from Public Health England show that up until November 11 only 52 per cent of over-65s – around 5.2million – had received the vaccine.</p><p>This is well below the 65 per cent who had been vaccinated at the same point last year.</p><p>Meanwhile, nearly 69 per cent of GPs say they have experienced a shortage of the jab, according to a survey by doctors’ magazine Pulse, forcing them to turn away elderly patients as a result.</p><p>Only 52 per cent of elderly patients have received the jab while 69 per cent of GPs reported a shortage of the vaccine</p><p>Fluad - the new system - has sparked rows between NHS England and GPs</p><p>The survey of 650 GPs revealed only 20 per cent of practices had had no trouble securing the vaccine.</p><p>Problems have been blamed on the staggered roll-out of the new, more effective jab for over-65s, which has been released in batches.</p><p>NHS officials insist that by tomorrow the final batches will have been delivered to surgeries and pharmacists.</p><p>They claim this will mean 7.8million vaccines will have been sent out – more than enough to hit the 73 per cent vaccination rate seen last year, when 7.4million over-65s received the jab.</p><p>But GPs say insufficient supplies in September, October and earlier this month meant they could not vaccinate as many patients as they liked.</p><p>The fiasco over the new jab – called Fluad – has triggered a war of words between NHS England and GPs. Officials insist GPs were given plenty of notice of the phased supply system, but doctors say they were only told in February – four months after they usually place their orders.</p><p>Dr Marie Williams, a GP from Blackpool, said: ‘It has been a complete debacle, wasting practice and patient time.</p><p>‘To add insult to injury, patients have been complaining that it’s the practice’s fault when clinic appointments have been sent out in good faith and supplies ordered in plenty of time.’</p><p> Pharmacist Phil Hunt believes the jabs shortage has set the NHS up for another bad winter.</p><p>Mr Hunt, in the job for 46 years, usually receives stocks by September. This year, however, the jabs did not arrive at Stokes Croft Pharmacy in Bristol until early November.</p><p>Because of the delays, some patients are likely to completely miss out on the vaccination, he added. Warning that flu season was on its way, Mr Hunt, 69, said: ‘The proportion of people who have not been able to get their vaccines is large enough that I think we are potentially in line for a bad winter.’</p><p>Mr Hunt, pictured, said everyone he had vaccinated in the past week said they had been back and forth to their local health centre – but there were no supplies left.</p><p>‘I don’t think the quantity of people injected will be anything like as high as it has been in previous years,’ he added. </p><p>Dr Melanie Blackman, a GP from Wiltshire, told Pulse: ‘Failed delivery times – delayed by two weeks – resulted in us having to cancel or move 170+ appointments.’</p><p>Last winter the jab given to millions had little effect because one of the strains it targeted had already mutated.</p><p>Doctors hope the improved vaccine will stop a repeat of that – but the supply issues could hit the vaccination effort.</p><p>Dr Richard Vautrey, of the British Medical Association’s GP committee, said: ‘Previously, many patients will have been used to receiving their vaccination on demand from their GP or pharmacist, but because of the phased delivery, this has not been possible this year.</p><p>'However, with the next delivery of vaccines expected this month, we have been assured that there are adequate supplies to vaccinate all those who need it.’</p><p>NHS England said: ‘This survey of little more than one per cent of GPs ignores the fact that this week, 100 per cent of vaccines will have been delivered by the manufacturer to those surgeries and pharmacists who placed an order on time, so the public can be assured that there is sufficient supply of the vaccine in stock for everyone to get protected.’</p><p>
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off the dirty ground and popping it in their own mouth to clean it.</p><p>But germophobe parents who would rather sterilise their child's pacifier or put it in the dishwasher may be raising their child's risk of allergies.</p><p>Mothers who suck a dummy clean after it gets dirty have children with fewer antibodies linked to asthma, food and dust allergies, a study found. </p><p>That may be because parents transfer their own bacteria to their child's mouth, helping to boost their immune system.</p><p>Germophobe parents who would rather sterilise their child's pacifier or put it in the dishwasher may be raising their child's risk of allergies</p><p>Researchers led by the Henry Ford Health System asked 128 mothers how they cleaned their children's dummies before taking blood tests from the infants.</p><p>Lower levels of immunoglobin E (igE) antibodies were found in the children whose parents used their own mouths instead of tap water or sterilisation.</p><p>Lead author Dr Eliane Abou-Jaoude said: 'We know that exposure to certain micro-organisms early in life stimulates development of the immune system and may protect against allergic diseases later.</p><p>'Parental pacifier sucking may be an example of a way parents may transfer healthy micro-organisms to their young children.' </p><p>Baby wipes increase children's risk of developing life-threatening food allergies, research suggested in April 2018.</p><p>Immune reactions to everyday produce like nuts, eggs and soy may be brought on by a 'perfect storm' of baby wipes, dust and food exposure, a study found in a 'major advance'.</p><p>Researchers believe this is due to an ingredient in soap found in baby wipes, known as sodium lauryl sulphate, lingering on infants' skin and disrupting its protective fatty barrier.</p><p>In youngsters with genetic mutations that predispose them to allergies, this disruption could lead to immune reactions if they are, for instance, kissed by a sibling with peanut butter on their face, according to the US researchers.</p><p>The scientists recommend parents reduce their youngsters' food allergy risk by washing their hands before touching them and rinsing off excess soap after baby wipe use.</p><p>Around one in 13 children in the US suffer from at least one food allergy, according to Food Allergy Research &amp; Education. </p><p>Lead author Professor Joan Cook-Mills, from Northwestern University, said: 'I thought about what are babies exposed to.</p><p>'They are exposed to environmental allergens in dust in a home.</p><p>'They may not be eating food allergens as a newborn, but they are getting them on their skin.</p><p>'Say a sibling with peanut butter on her face kisses the baby. Or a parent is preparing food with peanuts and then handles the baby. '</p><p>Professor Cook-Mills then investigated skin studies that assessed the impact of soap, saying: 'I thought "oh my gosh!' That's infant wipes!"' </p><p>Among the 128 mothers interviewed for the study, around one in eight sucked their child's dummy to clean it. </p><p>Slightly more than two in five chose to sterilise, boil or steam the pacifier, or to put it in the microwave or dishwasher.</p><p>The vast majority, 72 per cent, hand-washed their child's dummy by rinsing it under a tap or using washing up liquid.</p><p>Researchers wanted to see if there was any difference in igE, which is triggered when children have allergic responses to triggers like milk, peanuts, dust mites or pollen.</p><p>Taking blood from babies at birth, six and 18 months old, they found significantly lower levels of these antibodies in 18-month-old children whose mothers sucked their pacifier. There was no difference between dummies sterilised or hand-washed.</p><p>The authors, whose study is being presented at the annual meeting of the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology in Seattle, suggest healthy mouth bacteria passed on from adults may be responsible.</p><p>This backs up the 'hygiene hypothesis' which suggests children should be exposed to bugs to reduce their risk of allergies. </p><p>Those brought up in the countryside tend to have lower rates of asthma, which is commonly triggered by allergies.</p><p>Dr Edward Zoratti, a co-author of the study from Henry Ford, said: 'We found that parental pacifier sucking was linked to suppressed IgE levels beginning around 10 months, and continued through 18 months.</p><p>'Further research is needed, but we believe the effect may be due to the transfer of health-promoting microbes from the parent's mouth. </p><p>'It is unclear whether the lower IgE production seen among these children continues into later years.' </p><p>Dr Abou-Jaoude said: 'Although we can't say there's a cause and effect relationship, we can say the microbes a child is exposed to early on in life will affect their immune system development.'</p><p>Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline?</p><p>Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual.</p><p>Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline?</p><p> We will automatically post your comment and a link to the news story to your Facebook timeline at the same time it is posted on MailOnline. 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eld of hidden ingredients which could cause a life-threatening reaction.</p><p>But scientists have revealed a list of things sufferers can do to reduce their chances of having an attack.</p><p>By surveying people with food allergies experts found those who used the most allergy-avoidance strategies were least likely to suffer a reaction.</p><p>And taking 15 separate precautions was the magic number – people who used that many managed to avoid ever having reactions.</p><p>Speaking to the waiter and ordering food with simple ingredients were the most popular methods used by allergy suffers.</p><p>While other, less obvious, methods included ordering the allergy-sufferer's food separately, and sticking to chain restaurants.</p><p>Research being presented at the annual meeting of the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology revealed the methods for avoiding reactions.</p><p>And of a total of 24 strategies suggested, scientists found people who used 15 of them were able to avoid having allergic reactions during the study.</p><p>'We found when those with food allergies used more strategies in a restaurant, the result was fewer reactions,' said Dr Justine Ade, the study's author.</p><p>'People who used an average of 15 strategies when eating out tended to avoid having a severe allergic reaction.'</p><p>Experts suggest a particularly effective strategy is checking a restaurant's ingredients before you go, but they suggest taking multiple precautions.</p><p>Co-author and allergist Leigh Ann Kerns added: 'Checking ingredients in the dishes that the restaurant offers ahead of time and finding strategies that work for you or your child can help to minimize the risk of reactions.'</p><p>The full list of strategies, of which the researchers recommended using 15 to avoid every having a reaction, was:</p><p>The most commonly used method for avoiding reactions was speaking to the waiter on arriving at the restaurant, which 80 per cent of the 39 people in the survey did.</p><p>Also in the top five were ordering food with simple ingredients (77 per cent), double checking food before eating it (77 per cent), avoiding restaurants with a higher likelihood of contamination (74 per cent) and reviewing the ingredients on the restaurant's website beforehand (72 per cent).</p><p>The least used strategy was placing the food allergy order separately, which 23 per cent of people did.</p><p>Also in the bottom five were using a card explaining your allergies (26 per cent), not eating at restaurants (39 per cent), eating at chain restaurants (41 per cent), and going in off-peak hours (44 per cent).</p><p>There were 19 cases during the study when people had an allergic reaction while eating in a restaurant.</p><p>The researchers noticed people who had the reactions were taking precautions and became motivated to use more after they had suffered the reaction.</p><p>Dr Ade added: 'Those who did experience an allergic reaction were using an average of only six strategies at the time of their most severe reaction.</p><p>'Those same people increased their average number of strategies to 15 after experiencing a severe reaction.'</p><p>A food allergy is when a person's body reacts in an unhealthy way to a certain type of food. Although they are often mild, reactions can be serious enough to cause death.</p><p>The reactions happen when the immune system mistakenly thinks proteins in a particular food are a threat to the body, and begins to attack them.</p><p>Most foods could cause an allergic reaction in theory, but the most common ones are milk and dairy products, nuts, eggs, fish, fruit and shellfish.</p><p>Symptoms of an allergic reaction include itching in the mouth, throat or ears, an itchy red rash (also known as hives), swelling around the eyes, lips and tongue, and vomiting. </p><p>In extreme cases allergies can cause anaphylaxis, a potentially life threatening state in which people can find it difficult to breathe and may faint.</p><p>The best way of treating a food allergy is to avoid the food which is known to cause it, and antihistamines – such as hay fever tablets – can help to alleviate mild reactions. </p><p>Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline?</p><p>Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual.</p><p>Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline?</p><p> We will automatically post your comment and a link to the news story to your Facebook timeline at the same time it is posted on MailOnline. To do this we will link your MailOnline account with your Facebook account. We’ll ask you to confirm this for your first post to Facebook.</p><p>Part of the Daily Mail, The Mail on Sunday &amp; Metro Media Group</p>

nly dream of.</p><p>Between travelling around for shoots and representing brands in campaigns, the model knows all too well what to do to ensure she's always ready for the cameras.</p><p>Here, the Australian blonde offered a glimpse into her life, as she shared her secrets to beauty, fitness, food and travel, as well as her styling tips on channelling her look this summer.</p><p>Australian model Brooke Hogan has offered a glimpse into her life, as she shared her secrets to beauty, fitness, food, travel and her tips on channelling her look this summer</p><p>'I eat differently every single day but I have a very balanced diet and eat all types of foods,' she explained. </p><p>'I try and steer clear of processed sugars and full cream milk, as it doesn't agree with my stomach and skin.'</p><p>Every morning when she wakes up, she drinks a glass of warm water with lemon before she has breakfast.</p><p>'I usually have porridge and berries or eggs on toast for breakfast. Lunch is usually a healthy chicken salad or wrap and dinner is always some kind of vegetables or salad with meat or fish. My go-to dinner would be salmon, broccolini, sweet potatoes and roast tomatoes,' she said.</p><p>'It's important to remember your skin is an organ and you need to feed it with the right nutrients to make it glow,' she revealed.</p><p>'Simple things like a balanced diet, lots of water and enough sleep is the key to looking after your skin.</p><p>'You need to be consistent and diligent with your regime and make sure you are using quality products that are not full of nasty chemicals. </p><p>'One tip I have learnt is to cleanse twice at night to ensure you remove every little bit of makeup. I also make sure I always wear sunscreen, especially with our harsh Aussie sun. Hawaiian Tropic is my go-to – they just launched their Silk Hydration SPF 50+ range here.'</p><p>Between travelling around for shoots and representing brands in campaigns, the model knows all too well what to do to ensure she's always ready for the cameras</p><p>From pilates to high intensity workout, Brooke said she enjoys mixing up her fitness routine every week.</p><p>'Exercise for me is my time for myself and I choose to take this time to really zone out, refresh and re-energise my mind and body,' she said. </p><p>'I love pilates both physically and mentally and also love high intensity workouts. I exercise around four to six times a week depending on if I am travelling or not.'</p><p>'My body responds well to anything that makes me sweat - I love running and cardio based workouts that really get my heart rate going. I think it's really important to mix up your workouts so you don't get bored.' </p><p>When she's juggling a busy schedule, Brooke said she would always find time to squeeze in a walk or a 10-minute stretch on the floor just to get her body moving.</p><p>'My style is quite minimal and simple. I wear lots of denim and like to stick to outfits that I feel comfortable in,' she said. </p><p>'I definitely wouldn't say I am a "girly" girl but my go-to summer outfit would be a little wrap dress - easy to dress up or down and perfect with a pair with sneakers or sandals. I really love animal print at the moment too; it's everywhere.'</p><p>From pilates to high intensity workout, Brooke said she enjoys mixing up her fitness routine</p><p>As a model travelling to all parts of the world, Brooke knows all too well how to pack light for the journey. </p><p>'Don't over pack - there is nothing worse than an overfilled suitcase especially if you want to buy some goodies while you're away,' she said.</p><p>'Drink lots of water when you're on the aeroplane and buy a worldwide adapter so you don't get stuck with a dead phone or camera.'</p><p>'It depends if I am shooting or not. I always try and start my day by getting up early and moving my body,' she said. </p><p>'I set my alarm for around 6:15am and walk to pilates around 7am. I always get a coffee straight after (almond milk latte), and then I walk home, make breakfast and put on the morning news while looking at my to do list.</p><p>'I write a to-do list every night before I go to bed so I know what I need to do the next day. If I am shooting or have a meeting/event then I get myself prepared and organised for the day.</p><p>'If I am not shooting then I do lots of different things such as emails on my laptop, life admin, I go to the gym/go for a walk, catch up with family/friends etc.</p><p>'I find that when I am on my laptop, hours can pass without me even realising so when I am working from home I always try and make a conscious effort not to sit in one spot for too long and get my body moving.</p><p>'I usually have dinner around 6:30pm with the aim of getting to bed no later than 9pm. I will have an hour off my phone with the intention of being asleep by 10 latest.'</p><p>
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ers blood sugar levels, research suggests.</p><p>Indulging in a warm soak for an hour triggers the release of a chemical that combats inflammation in the same way as exercise.</p><p>Taking some time out in the tub also releases a substance that lowers blood pressure, the study also found.</p><p>Relaxing in a hot bath both improves inflammation and lowers blood-sugar levels (stock)</p><p>Researchers from Loughborough University analysed ten sedentary, overweight men after they either sat in a 38°C (100.4°F) bath or rested for an hour.</p><p>Blood samples were taken before, immediately after and two hours post the immersion to test the men's glucose and insulin levels, as well as to look for markers of inflammation.</p><p>Heart rate, blood pressure and body temperature recordings were also taken every 15 minutes during the bath.</p><p>The men who had the hot bath were then asked to have ten more at home over two weeks before undergoing additional blood tests.</p><p>Results showed that just one hot bath raises levels of the inflammatory chemical IL-6 in the bloodstream. This also increases during exercise, which triggers an inflammatory response.</p><p>Peaks in IL-6 are then followed by the release of substances that combat unhealthy levels of inflammation. </p><p>Taking hot baths could be a better way of treating depression than exercising, a study found in October.</p><p>People who go to a spa for an hour twice a week show better improvements in their mental health than those who work out regularly.</p><p>Experts suggested this could be because it restores the body's natural temperature rhythm over the course of a day, which can be disrupted in depressed patients.</p><p>Regular bathing is faster-acting and easier than exercise, scientists said, and the study showed people are more likely to continue with it over the long term.</p><p>Researchers from the University of Freiburg in Germany tested the effects of thermal baths on 45 people with depression. The research was published on the website bioRxiv. </p><p>A single hot soak also triggered the release of nitric oxide, which relaxes blood vessels and therefore decreases blood pressure. </p><p>After the men's daily at-home baths, their blood sugar and insulin levels were lower while they were fasting and resting.</p><p>The study was published in the Journal of Applied Physiology. </p><p>The researchers, led by PhD student Sven Hoekstra, believe a bath could 'improve aspects of the inflammatory profile and enhance glucose metabolism in sedentary, overweight males'.</p><p>They added a hot soak 'might have implications for improving metabolic health in populations unable to meet the current physical activity recommendations'.</p><p>A person may be unable to exercise if they have suffered an injury, an asthma flare-up or a concussion.</p><p>The participants did, however, report feeling uncomfortable during the hour-long bath, which may be due to the temperature of the water or the amount of time they spent in it.</p><p>Around one in four adults worldwide suffer from high blood pressure. </p><p>If it is consistently high, this puts an extra strain on the heart, which has been linked to a higher risk of a heart attack, heart failure and stroke, as well as kidney disease and even dementia. </p><p>Inflammation has been linked to everything from asthma and coeliac disease to Crohn's and even organ transplant rejection. </p><p>This comes after research released earlier this month suggested exposure to blue light lowers a person's blood pressure.</p><p>After 14 healthy men were exposed to blue light for just half-an-hour, their blood pressure levels were reduced just as much as with medication, according to a study by the University of Surrey and Heinrich Heine University Dusseldorf.</p><p>
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translate the thoughts of patients who have lost their speech into words. </p><p>Technology has made leaps and bounds to bridge the rift that forms between mind and body when one (or both) are damaged by disease. </p><p>Amputees can now be fit with futuristic mind-controlled body limbs; bionic eyes give sight to the sightless, cochlear implants allow the deaf to hear. </p><p>Restoring speech, however, presents unique challenges and has mostly remained in the realm of science fiction and the (mostly) pseudoscience of telepathy. </p><p>Ambitious scientists scattered across the world are on the brink of changing that with implants that act as 'brain-computer interfaces' that may soon be able to broadcast the voices inside a speechless patients' heads. </p><p>Researchers at Columbia University and Northwell Health are using electrodes on volunteers' brains to learn the electrical impulse language of the brain so they can translate it and give speech back to paralyzed patients (file) </p><p>Up until his death in March, British cosmologist Stephen Hawking was one of the most influential and famous thinkers, teachers and speakers of the last century. </p><p>But for the last 30 years of his life, he had no voice. </p><p>Computer assistance allowed the brilliant astrophysicist to go on to speak all over the world nonetheless. The voice of 'Perfect Paul' - an early synthesized speech tool with an American accent designed for telephone prompt responses - became Hawking's signature tenor. </p><p>Synthetic voice technology improved, but Hawking stuck with Paul's slightly halting speech. He did, however, progress through various control mechanisms. </p><p>Once his thumb could no longer choose letters, an innovative system that picked up on the subtle twitches of his cheeks allowed Hawking to go on communicating. </p><p>But Perfect Paul never did read Hawking's brilliant mind directly. 'Speaking' meant a letter-selection process that - even with the latest and greatest predictive text technologies - would always undoubtedly be slower than the great scientist's natural speech and meditations on the history of time. </p><p>ALS-stricken Stephen Hawking used a computer-assisted communication device that translated his thumb or facial movements into words - but it didn't read his mind</p><p>Now, neuroscientists and engineers at Columbia University and Northwell Health in New York are mapping the brain's private language so that they may soon be able to translate the voice inside our heads. </p><p>Different regions of the brain communicate with one another through a combination of electrical impulses and chemical messengers. </p><p>Listening and speech are centered in Broca's area, which is responsible both for the brain's voice and the 'mind's ear,' as well. And Wernicke's area controls our word choices. </p><p>This would be life-changing to patients with paralysis from injuries, ALS or locked-in syndrome. </p><p>ALS often eventually attacks the bulbar neurons, which control the motor function or movements involved in the physical act of speaking. </p><p>Loss of that function doesn't mean that language is lost altogether - we just need to learn to understand the brain's language. </p><p>So Dr Nima Mesgarani, an electrical engineering professor is listening in on brain chatter using implanted electrode strips, according to Stat News. </p><p>His electrodes record the electrical cracks and snaps in the brain, and sends them to a computer that then tries to make heads or tails of them. </p><p>Just like any other language, Dr Mesgarani's computer needs to keep learning more and more of the brain's electrical vocabulary. </p><p>So Dr Mesgarani has partnered with Dr Ashesh Mehta and his volunteers, epileptic patients who are allowing the scientists to implant their brains with the electrodes during surgeries to find the source of their seizures. </p><p>The more patients they implant, the better they'll know how to identify words. </p><p>The first step is to learn what our brain's electrical activity looks like when we say 'yes' or 'no' to ourselves. </p><p>We are still a long way off from translating complex thoughts, however, and these will likely remain locked away in the mind for some time to come.</p><p>But neither they nor the handful of other scientists working on similar medical technologies are the only ones interested in brain-computer interfaces. </p><p>Facebook, Elon Musk's Neuralink, and other technology companies have launched similar research and development efforts - with less philanthropic purposes in mind. </p><p>In 2017, Facebook announced its own goal of making a Face Brain, so to speak, that promises thought-to-text technology, so the Internet never has to miss out on a single thing you think. </p><p>The Facebook team has insisted that thought-to-text is no longer science fiction, but Dr Mesgarani and Dr Mehta are taking a more measured approach. </p><p>The five patients they recruited then had to painstakingly repeat numbers and stories until the doctors had recorded their brains' electrical impulse patterns. </p><p>These signals were then fed into a kind of medical synth, to see if they'd come out like language or gibberish. </p><p>Dr Mesgarani and Dr Mehta got something in between. </p><p>Most prior systems had only produced 'words' that were about half-and-half nonsense and comprehensible. The new brain translator was about 75 percent 'intelligible.' </p><p>'We have a good framework for producing accurate and intelligible reconstructed speech from brain activity,' Dr Mesgarani told Stat. </p><p>And that's 'a step toward the next generation of human-computer interaction systems … for patients suffering from paralysis and locked-in syndrome.' </p><p>
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